


Love Is A Battleground

by Primarybufferpanel (ArwenLune)



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Always A Jedi Kilindi, Always A Jedi Maul, Banter, Battle Couple, F/M, It's Not The Future AU, Jedi!Maul AU, Maul is a dramatic bastard even as a Jedi, Nautolan, Nicknames, happy Maul
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-09
Updated: 2020-12-09
Packaged: 2021-03-09 17:40:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27980160
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArwenLune/pseuds/Primarybufferpanel
Summary: "INCOMING SHIPS!"Kilindi looked up, a flash of dismay at the possibility of reinforcements for the enemy, but then she felt the Force-brush of mind against mind, and her heart soared. Any fellow Jedi would have been a relief, but there was nothing like the arrival ofthisJedi to lift her spirits.
Relationships: Kilindi Matako/Darth Maul
Comments: 6
Kudos: 42
Collections: Star Wars Rare Pairs 2020





	Love Is A Battleground

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Carmarthen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Carmarthen/gifts).
  * Inspired by [It's Not The Future AU](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/723861) by Scuttlebuttin. 



> The awesome AU this is based on is art-only. [You can look at it here](https://scuttlebuttin.tumblr.com/tagged/It%27s-Not-The-Future-AU).

"It's not looking great, General!" Titou called to her, and Kilindi swept another look over the battlefield, the amount of battledroids coming at Tra'cor Company.

"Wish I could disagree, Commander," she called back, launching herself forward to land in the middle of a knot of droids and sweeping up her lightsaber. She could destroy as many as she was capable of - and she was capable of destroying a lot of them - but still they kept coming. There were too many , and these were well-shielded; her troopers were struggling to do much with their blasters. Grenades worked, but their supply of those wouldn't hold.

She hit her comms. "Have the men retreat to the other side of the valley!"

"We'll get pinned down!"

"If we don't, we'll be dead!" she retorted. They'd commed for help hours ago—she had to hope it would come through soon.

Kilindi waded further into the fray, getting ahead of her men and trying to give them space to free themselves and pull their wounded brothers up and to where her medic Colo could tend to them. There was a line of droidekas that had been hammering her troops for the hours now, and she was determined to fight through the waves of B2s to destroy them.

It was slow going; the B2s just kept coming. By the time the droidekas were in sight, she was panting lightly. Nautolan didn't sweat, and her head tresses, which normally helped regulate her temperature, were caught back in a wrap to keep them safe from battledroid pinchers. It was a warm, arid planet and the full body armour she wore didn't allow for much air circulation.

"INCOMING SHIPS!"

Kilindi looked up, a flash of dismay at the possibility of reinforcements for the enemy, but then she felt the Force-brush of mind against mind, and her heart soared. Any fellow Jedi would have been a relief, but there was nothing like the arrival of _this_ Jedi to lift her spirits.

"HORNET COMPANY!" she called back, never pausing in her methodical dismantling of battledroids. A ragged cheer went up behind her.

Four Larties came in, making to land on the far side of the valley where they could attack the droids from the other side. Then one of the transports skimmed overhead, and a figure dropped down from it, dark robes flaring.

She'd seen him do it before, and it was heartstopping every time; he had an unrivalled flair for the dramatic even among the Jedi. Plummeting straight down into the thick of the battle, his red skin lit up in the low sunlight. Kilindi felt her mental connection to him flare to life and bared her teeth in ferocious joy. Maul steadied his fall, slowed down, and the two ends of his golden saberstaff hummed to life just as he landed in a crouch directly on top of a droideka, lightsaber plunging down into it.

Kilindi felt her own battle-spirit surging. She beheaded a B2 and brute-forced her way through the next two, split through the next with a brutal overhand blow, and then, finally, she'd reached him.

"Cuttlefish!" Maul called out in a delighted voice, deliberately softening the t's so it sounded more like cuddlefish. He vaulted off a stack of destroyed droidekas and put his back to hers, and the force between them sang with the fierce joy of protectiveness, of slotting together like two halves of a fearsome whole.

Jedi loved peace and strove for it in all they did. That didn't mean that they, both warriors from predatory species, couldn't find joy in fighting together when a fight was what was needed.

"Prickly pear!" she sang back, grinning and knowing he could hear it. "It's so good to see you!"

She stepped out, went to one knee to stab a clanker from below, and then force-heaved it up and bowled into the three droids behind it. At her back, she heard the humming of Maul's saberstaff, spun into an impenetrable wall of gold as he systematically turned battledroids into slag.

"Anytime you need me, my lovely minnow!"

Maul's Hornet Company was equipped with high-capacity repeating blaster cannons that made quick work of the B2s. Nowthat the droidekas were no longer anchoring the line of clankers, Hornet's distinctive red and black patterned helmets were advancing from across the valley while Kilindi's Tra'cors threw themselves back into the fray. They had been fighting all day and she knew there were a lot of injuries; she would not have blamed them if they'd let Hornet's fresh fighters handle it. Yet she also knew they loathed being rescued. Hornet Company would gladly rescue them, but also lord it over them a little, all in the spirit of brotherhood. Her men preferred to be on their feet if they could be, and the heavy thunder of the blaster cannons as it echoed through the valley gave them new energy.

It took perhaps another hour for them to get the last droid dismantled and for silence to fall in the valley.

It was immediately broken again by both their comms, with updates on injured and casualty numbers. Hornet's medic Nydak jogged past in the direction where Tra'cor had taken shelter, barely pausing to salute Maul and Kilindi and call out a 'That's what I call a sting operation, sirs!'

Maul groaned, as if he didn't come up with a solid third of the hornet jokes himself.

When the first rush of organisation settled into quick, efficient post-battle routines, Kilindi stepped close to Maul and swept him up in her arms, pulling him up onto his toes. He was wearing a chest and back plate over his robes, a compromise between his fighting style and the concern of his troopers.

"My darling porcupine," she told him, carefully pressing their foreheads together. He wrinkled his nose in the weakest version of a snarl, and she tightened her arms about him, grinning.

"Do _not_ crack my armour again, I finally got it to sit just right," he said, but his voice softened, dropping low and fond. He slipped his hand to the back of her neck, under her headtresses, and undid the cloth wrap she'd been using. She shivered at his touch in that sensitive, vulnerable place, feeling his fingers rub away the irritation of the knot. Several of her tresses coiled themselves around his forearm, encouraging his touches. Kilindi dropped her forehead to his shoulder, pressing her face into the folds of his collar. Took a deep breath, and the pheromones of his affection rang through her senses.

"Adorable anemone," he whispered smugly. She straightened, half considering dumping him on his ass in retaliation, but then he pulled her head down to him for a kiss, and she decided she could live with anemone.


End file.
